Education should start in a child's home

Schools should stick to reading, writing and arithmetic

Jana Mathia, Whitman County Gazette | Last updated Apr 16, 2020 11:57am0

One of the positives to come out of the current coronavirus crisis is that people are realizing what the most important and essential things are.

When you only have time or resources for the top priorities, those priorities have to be more defined.

As the model for schooling has drastically changed, the curriculum has been stripped bare, reminding us the true purpose of schools — teaching the so-callled “3 Rs” reading, writing and arithmetic.

Remember the uproar over the state’s mandated new “inclusive” sex education curriculum just a few weeks ago (before the COVID-19 quarantine)?

Many parents statewide were challenging the requirement to begin teaching the so-called inclusive “SeXXX Ed” to students as young as kindergarteners. The new curriculum requires inclusion of gay, lesbian, heterosexual and other intimate contacts to be taught. The mandate was roundly criticized as overreaching and indoctrination og alternative lifestyles.

It shouldn’t be a surprise that public education has moved away from its primary purpose. For years, parents have been surrendering control of children’s education.

Schools are criticized for graduating students that didn’t know basic skills. Adulting 101 classes were instituted to teach how to clean, fold clothes, cook and balance a checkbook.

The thought that your adult children were so ill-prepared for the real world that they have to take an “adulting” class? That should have insulted any stable, nuclear family. It didn’t, because that education had been pushed onto the schools.

Instead of using home as a teaching environment and including children in basic chores, parents who dared institute such things were berated for child labor and not letting “kids be kids.” We find ourselves stuck in this juxtaposition, where kids who were never taught “adult” skills are struggling when they leave home. Let’s face it — teachers cannot successfully assume the role of parents.

Schools go above and beyond what they were created for — to teach the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic. When you boil it down, those are really the three basics priorities in education.

History and social studies are nice to teach. But if a student learns to read, they can read about history and social sciences. Science is important, too. But ultimately, sciense is a combination of reading and math.

If parents want their children to grow up with their morals and ethics, then they need to teach them at home. Teachers could then focus solely on the basics.

Parents need to own the tough side of parenting and teach children the things they need to be good adults.

Sex education can be a difficult subject for a parent to discuss, but that doesn’t mean it should be left up to teachers who may have different ethics, values and morals.

It’s wonderful that a trained medical person can talk about biology and physical changes. But do they really need to teach youngsters “inclusive” sexual contact?

Now that schools have identified priorities for public education, parents need to take responsibility and use home, clubs and groups as teaching tools.

“Inclusive” sex education isn’t a fundamental for distance learning. It shouldn’t be in the classroom, either.

— Jana Mathia is the editor of the Whitman County Gazette. Email her at wcgazette@gmail.com.